Frog Went A Courtin'

Linda and I went shopping for a few hours last week, and had some time before our scheduled dinner with friends, so we saw “The Princess and The Frog”.

• It’s very nice to see Disney back in the hand-drawn animation department. The artwork was beautifully done.
• After the 1st 5 minutes, Linda turned to me and said, “Are you crying yet?” No, not until about 10 minutes later.
• I was already familiar with some of the songs, since I had heard them during Princess Tiana’s Showboat Revue at Disneyland. That was a cool show: I was humming tunes and wanting some of the props with the fleur-de-lis on them. I also enjoyed them in the film, including the ones that I had not already heard. Princess Tiana’s voice is my favorite.
• The villain kinda creeped me out on a personal level, because he reminds me of someone I know that also creeps me out.
• The movie made me want to go to New Orleans. It also made me want gumbo and beignets. Perhaps I should just go to Disneyland and have all of that there. But I do want to visit the real NO some day. I know that it’s been hurt a lot by Hurricane Katrina, but I’m sure that there is still a lot of Bourbon Street that I would enjoy.
• I really liked the twist on the old fairy tale, and that Tiana was familiar with the original tale before kissing the frog.
• The whole mucus thing now cracks me up, because I had a “frog in my throat” the other day and realized that the colloquialism must have come from the fact that frogs have mucus on them. I thought to myself, “that’s not slime, that’s mucus!” OK, so that was gross, but it makes me giggle now.
• So the gator goes and looks for a stick to help out the frogs, and then those guys are froggin'. Of course, I say to myself, "Gig 'em, Aggies!"...because I'm insane like that. *
• I didn’t know that stars could hold hands.
• I want to eat at Tiana’s restaurant! Looks swanky, with yummy food.

I look forward to watching this over and over again with my niece when it comes out on DVD.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
* I can't believe that I never posted this on my original trip report to Texas A&M, so here goes. Liz, Angela and I were in the Texas A&M Bookstore, and we saw this picture on a t-shirt. Since I like to learn about local customs, I decided to ask one of the student workers there what, exactly, "Gig 'Em, Aggies" meant. Here is the exchange.

Sherry: What does "Gig 'Em" mean?

Student: Well, you know when you go froggin'?

Sherry (incredulously): No.

Student: When you go froggin', you hold a pointed stick in your hand and make a fist to hold it, and you stab the frog with the stick. That's called "gigging".

Sherry (trying to keep a straight face): Oh, OK. Thanks!

I then explained this to Liz and Angela. Liz was mortified. Angela said, "Oh, I was going to get that shirt because I thought that it was a 'thumbs up' sign. I don't want it now." (Angela likes frogs). None of us ended up getting the bull beanie with its longhorns sawed off, either. That chant is "Saw 'em off!" directed at their rivals, U of Texas (the Longhorns). Texans are violent. That was a great trip.

Anyway, sorry to add frog death to this post, but I needed to remind y'all of that for posterity. :)